A variety of different products are shipped in cargo containers. Products are typically packed into the container by a shipper, and then the container doors are closed and secured. The container is then transported to a destination, where a recipient opens the container and unloads the products.
The shipper often finds it desirable to have some form of security and/or monitoring in place while the container is being transported. For example, the cargo within the container may include relatively valuable products, such as computers or other electronic devices. Thieves may thus attempt to break into the container and steal these products if the container is left unattended during transport. It is not cost-feasible to achieve suitable security and/or monitoring by having a person watch the container at all times during transport. Accordingly, various devices have previously been developed to provide some degree of security and/or monitoring. Although these pre-existing devices have been generally adequate for their intended purposes, they have not been satisfactory in all respects.
For example, one pre-existing container security device is commonly referred to as a bolt seal. It includes an elongate bolt or pin with a head at one end. The bolt is inserted through aligned openings in a latch mechanism on the container doors, and then the free end of the bolt is inserted into a retaining assembly. The retaining assembly mechanically and permanently grips the bolt, so that the bolt cannot be withdrawn. The bolt has an electrically conductive core and an electrically conductive sleeve that are separated by an electrically insulating layer, except that the core and sleeve are in an electrical contact in the region of the head of the bolt. The retaining assembly has a circuit with two electrical contacts that respectively engage the conductive core and the conductive sleeve. Since the core and sleeve are electrically shorted at the head of the bolt, the two contacts of the circuit are also electrically shorted during normal operation.
If a thief cuts the bolt at a location between the head and the retaining assembly, the removal of the head eliminates the internal electrical short between the conductive core and the conductive sleeve. Since the core and the sleeve are no longer shorted, the contacts of the circuit are also no longer shorted, and thus the circuit can tell that someone has tampered with the bolt. The circuit can optionally include a radio transmitter, and the radio transmitter can then transmit a wireless signal indicating that the circuit has detected tampering.
In practice, devices of this type do not always operate in this intended manner. As one example, pre-existing bolts often have a conductive sleeve made from nickel, which is a relatively soft material. When a thief cuts the bolt, the jaws of the bolt cutter can smear the nickel material in a radially inward direction as the cut is made. When this smear occurs, it creates an electrical short between the conductive sleeve and the conductive core. Thus, even though the original internal short is eliminated with the removal of the bolt head, it is effectively replaced by an equivalent short in the form of the nickel smear. Due to this new short, the contacts of the circuit in the retaining assembly remain electrically shorted. Consequently, the circuit does not detect the fact that tampering has occurred, and does not take appropriate action.
In terms of testing a bolt configuration, several bolts with that configuration may each be subjected to a “loose cargo test” conforming to a well-known standard defined by MIL-STD 310F, and then a bolt cutting test of the type discussed above. Pre-existing bolt configurations tend to fail rapidly in the loose cargo test, without ever making it as far as the bolt cutting test.